My name is Dave Stancliff. Walk down the road of life with me each day. You'll find news and my views. I'm a Vietnam Veteran, father to three sons, proud grandfather 5 times over, an independent thinker, and a former newspaper publisher and editor.

Tuesday, September 5, 2017

Good Journalism Still Exists in the Age of 'Fake' News

"He campaigned on applause-line policies: Anything that roused a response from his rabid adherents, he repeated and amplified. He never gave details because the details didn’t exist, and he wouldn’t have been able to understand and articulate them if they did." Opinion, NY Times, 7/20/17Good Day World!There are two great newspapers in America that understand good journalism. They both are setting the gold standard for investigative reporting in the 21st century.The New York Times, and The Washington Post.It's no wonder Trump hates them both. Unlike CNN, Fox, or MSNBC, they really strive for fair and balanced reporting. They are the top two newspapers in the nation with millions of subscribers.The people who read the NY Times and the Washington Post aren't interested in alternate realities presented by bias publications and websites.Readers of these two newspapers have the ability to read beyond one paragraph, and to comprehend difficult issues facing our world.As a retired newspaper editor and publisher, I know that mistakes can happen with the best of publications. When they do, a correction is run the next day.This is just one of the differences between legitimate reporting, and sensational fact-free reporting which has become so prevalent. The news and the editorial sections are separated in the NY Times and The Washington Post, unlike most other publications where the two merge all too often on the front page.My fellow journalists today face challenges I never dreamed of when I worked. The fact that more people are politically hardwired complicates the situation.A straight fact-filled news story is suddenly challenged because it doesn't fit a certain world view; left, or right. This blurring of reality makes it that much harder to get the truth out.The icing on the cake however is our president's loathing for the free press, who he calls the enemy. In spite of that, The NY Times and The Washington Post have managed to turn out great investigative stories that rival the Watergate reporting.Make no mistake, The NY Times and The Washington Post are two of the last bastions of credible reporting in America. Fake and bias news has no place to hid in these publications.You can fact-check them on numerous websites from PolitFact to Snopes to assure yourself your not reading someone's fantasy.It's not that there aren't other good newspapers out there, it's just that they don't have the history or quality of reporting that The NY Times and The Washington Post have. Take heart. There's still some good journalism in America.Time for me to walk on down the road...